Kronan

The 126 gun battleship Kronan was built in 1668 by Francis Sheldon and was one of the world's
largest ships in its time. She was 53 m long and 14 m wide.

During battle against a Danish-Dutch fleet in June 1676, Kronan listed heavily during a badly prepared
turn, then suddenly exploded and quickly sank with 800 men. Only 42 survived. What caused the blast is a
mystery, perhaps something broke loose during the list and ignited the gunpowder. Possibly Lorentz Creutz,
the newly appointed commander and admiral, is to blame for incompetence, because he had no naval
experience before commanding the ship.

Discovery

This was one of the lost wrecks that engineer/archaeologist
Anders Franzén found in Swedish archives and placed on a search list.
Finally, Franzén together with Bengt Grisell and Sten Ahlberg found the ship in 1980 off Öland in the
south Baltic Sea on 27 m depth.

The hull is broken apart but a large section of the port shipside is intact and laying with the outside
facing the bottom clay. This will possibly be salvaged in the future.

Bronze guns

Already shortly after the sinking, between 1680 and 1686, 60 guns were
salvaged using primitive dive bells, and then the ship was forgotten for centuries. But the old divers
only got half of the guns. Originally, she had between 124 and 128 bronze guns. So fortunately the wreck
has remained a gold mine for bronze guns. Between 1980 and '87 another 32 guns have been salvaged. They
are in sizes from 6 to 36 pounds, and cast between 1514 and 1661. Some of them may well have come from the
Vasa, sunk in 1628. The oldest gun, from 1514, is the oldest known
muzzle-loaded gun in Scandinavia.

Investigations

This has become the largest underwater archaeology project in Sweden. Initiated in 1981 and will
continue a few more seasons. Plenty of well-preserved objects have been excavated so far. Among the finds
are about 400 kg bones from the victims. These remains have been investigated by the osteologist Ebba
During.

During 1982-83 a cask with ca 260 gold coins was found – that's the largest gold coin treasure ever
found in Sweden.

In 1998 a complete cross staff was found as well as a
magnificent case of tin bottles.

In 2001 a pharmacy chest was found, containing 70 bottles and medicine cans.

Future

The excavations will continue for a few more seasons. Then a decision has to be made whether to raise
the entire shipside, now laying face-down on the bottom. Hopefully many of the decorations are still in
position and well preserved. But such an operation will be very expensive, including conservation. More
private donors and sponsors would be needed to proceed. The project is headed by Lars Einarsson. Contact
Kalmar County Museum, tel +46-480-563 00, fax +46-480-563 32, for details. Recreational diving on the site
is not permitted.